Consumers with inequity aversion experience some psychological disutility when buying products at unfair prices. Empirical evidence and behavioral research have suggested that consumers may perceive a firm's price as unfair when its profit margin is too high relative to consumers’ surplus. The authors develop an analytical framework to investigate the effects of the consumer's inequity aversion on a firm's optimal pricing and quality decisions. They highlight several findings. First, because of the consumer's uncertainty about the firm's cost, the firm's optimal quality may be nonmonotone with respect to the degree of the consumer's inequity aversion. Second, stronger inequity aversion makes an inefficient firm worse off but may benefit an efficient firm. Third, stronger inequity aversion by the consumer can actually lower the consumer's monetary payoff (economic surplus) because the firm may reduce its quality to a greater extent than it reduces its price. Finally, as the expected cost efficiency in the market decreases, both the expected quality and the social surplus may increase rather than decrease.

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To expand sales, many manufacturers try to develop and sell product lines. Frequently, however, the operations of distributing a product line creates tension between manufacturers and retailers as they do not necessarily agree on which product versions included in the product line should be sold to consumers. To mitigate this tension, previous literature has shown that if a manufacturer (he) wants to sell his product line through a retailer (she) who faces deterministic demand, then he needs to adjust his product qualities according to her requirements; otherwise she will not carry the entire line. In contrast, this paper shows that if demand is stochastic, then a manufacturer can mitigate the same tension merely by re-allocating inventory risk in the supply chain. This strategy can be so effective that it is possible to find cases where the equilibrium product line is actually longer in a decentralized supply chain than in the direct-selling case. To understand the tradeoff, we consider a supply chain with a manufacturer capable of producing multiple product designs and a retailer who faces stochastic consumer demand. The manufacturer sells his output through the retailer using one of the following variations on the classical wholesale contract: push (PH), pull (PL), or instantaneous fulfillment (IF). With PH and PL (IF), wholesale prices and quantities are decided before (after) demand is revealed. Retail prices are always set after demand is revealed. With PH (PL) the retailer (manufacturer) carries retail inventory. Taking the manufacturer's point of view, we characterize the equilibrium product line length and equilibrium contracting strategy. Our answers are determined by three important drivers: demand variability, product substitutability, and the retailer's outside option. Low outside option and low (high) substitutability imply that the manufacturer maximizes his expected profit offering the retailer longer (shorter) product line using the IF contract. As outside option increases, the equilibrium contract will be either PH or PL. High demand variability and low substitutability imply that the manufacturer should be expected to sell a longer product line with a PH contract. Low demand variability and high substitutability imply that the manufacturer should be expected to sell a shorter product line with a PL contract.

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The room-temperature creep resistance of the Co 56 Ta 9 B 35 metallic glass was determined by a nanoindentation technique. Results showed that the creep curves were described by a generalized Kelvin model. The low creep strain-rate sensitivity parameter and creep rate derived from the displacement-holding time curves demonstrated the high creep resistance of the Co 56 Ta 9 B 35 metallic glass. The deformation mechanism causing the nanoindentation creep was discussed based on the "shear transformation zone" concept, which gave an explanation for the creep behavior in metallic glasses. A number of Co-based multicomponent metallic glass (MG) systems have been reported, including Co-Fe-(Ta,Mo)-(B,Si) [1-4], (Co-Fe)-(Nb,Zr)-(B,Si) [5-9], (Co,Fe,Ni)-(Zr,Hf,Nb,Ta,Mo,W)-B [10] and Co-Fe-B-Si [11]. The family of Co-based MGs has been widely studied in recent decades. A wide range of material properties have been investigated, including glassforming ability [7-9], thermal stability, strength [1][2][3]8] and magnetic properties [2,7,[9][10][11]. For instance, the Co 43 Fe 20 Ta 5.5 B 31.5 MG has been reported to be the strongest MG [2] with promising magnetic applications [1,2,4,[12][13][14]. The tensile strengths of Co-Si-B and Co-Ta-Si-B alloys have been reported to range from 3580 to 4000 MPa, respectively. When Fe is removed from the Co-Fe-Ta-B ribbon and wire MGs [12], the fracture strength of Co-based MGs can even increase to above 6000 MPa.Co 65 À x Ta x B 35 (at.%, x = 5-11) [12,15] systems have rapidly become of broad interest, having set the record for the highest strength among the known bulk glassy alloys, with an elastic modulus and hardness of 280 and 17.8 GPa, respectively. Our recent research [15,16] on the compressibility of CoTaB MGs under high pressure by using synchrotron radiation X-ray diffraction (XRD) confirmed that the charge density and bonding character demonstrate that the covalent character of Co-B and B-B bonds is the reason for the high elastic modulus and hardness in CoTaB MGs [15].Very recently, a plasticity ternary Co 61 Nb 8 B 31 bulk MG was fabricated with a plasticity of 5% and a yield strength of 5200 MPa [17]. However, the room-temperature creep-resistance behavior of Co-based MGs has not been reported. The plastic deformation of MGs and the related mechanism are considered to be among the most important aspects of their engineering application. Thus, studying the creep-resistance behavior of materials can enable the selection of appropriate materials in different environments. Given the size limitation of MGs, many of their mechanical properties cannot be studied by traditional methods. A new nanoindentation technique has recently paved a new path for research on the plastic deformation of glassy alloys [18]. Therefore, in this work, we use Co 56 Ta 9 B 35 as a model MG to study the creep-resistance behavior at room temperature using the nanoindentation technique.The amorphous ribbon was prepared by the meltspinning technique in an argon atmosphere. The glassy structure of the alloys ...